[KRX]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kickback

It's the same with every franchise though - the starting "cast" that made the franchise popular will ALWAYS be the one they use to get people to pay attention.

Transformers? Optimus Prime, Megatron, Bumblebee, Starscream, Ratchet ... they're in every series now. Movies, animated shows, comics ... you can't NOT find them. And while they may be "DIFFERENT" from the 1984 launch version, in essence, they're still the same.

Star Wars? It will always be Luke, Leia, Han, Chewy, Vader, Boba, and Yoda. Just look at the first releases for the Star Wars Black Label series ... with the exception of maybe one or two (Darth Maul), it's pretty much Movie 4's cast.

Power Rangers? There may be 20 years of history, but Mighty Morphin sells ... especially to the nostalgia boom, which Power Rangers is just now getting (Transformers had it about 10 years ago as well).

One just has to hope they throw the fans of the other 17 series some love

With Transformers, I can let it slide because they tell the same story with the same characters but in a new and (usually) interesting way. You have G1 which is very episodic and campy in nature, a few story arcs being thrown in here and there; you also have Prime, which has a larger, over-arching story and takes itself seriously. It has begun to bother me a bit that they are focusing more on G1 in the Generations line, but I don't see much else that can be done, given the later series already having more screen-accurate figures available. Besides, Hasbro has announced a new Armada Starscream, which shows me that they do care about other generations.

Star Wars I can forgive because they're telling one story and sticking to it, but it takes place over a long period of time. The Clone Wars is a good show, but it has its own toyline already that (I think) is still ongoing. It also helps that those characters are also from the prequel trilogy, essentially tackling two genres at once.

Power Rangers is a combination of the two. It takes place in the same universe (with one exception), and it tells the same basic story with varying elements in every season. However, there is more than one set of characters. Even in MMPR, every Ranger color (save for Blue, Green, and White) had more than one character behind it (although most merchandise represents the suit, not the Ranger). I can understand why they would cater to the original cast, but there are so many more characters that had time devoted to them for audiences to get to know and care for them. Yet Bandai constantly decides to make new toys for the originals, leaving other seasons to collect dust. I could forgive this if it weren't for the fact that we're supposed to be celebrating 20 years of Power Rangers and not the first three. I can understand why the SDCC exclusives this year are MMPR-oriented, since Bandai doesn't have pre-existing molds of old seasons that would fit in with the current toyline, but I would expect them to acknowledge the market available in previous seasons as well. As long as it looks cool, a kid will be inclined to buy it. Heck, most of my Power Rangers collection was obtained before I watched an episode of the respective series.

To summarize this post, I can see why, but I don't like it anyway.